


Choices

by VellaNikola



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Bloodbender Katara (Avatar), Bloodbending (Avatar), Dark, Dark Katara (Avatar), F/M, Fire Nation Royal Family, Murder, One Shot, Post-100 Year War (Avatar TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 01:01:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29709246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VellaNikola/pseuds/VellaNikola
Summary: Decisions can be difficult and consequences unpredictable. While the past cannot be unwritten, the future cannot be foretold.The Fire Lord falls to his knees before his council and begs for their guidance and the world is not what it was.
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 32





	Choices

#  _**ASC 110:** Ten years after the fall of the Phoenix King._

“You need to stop lying to yourself, Zuko. It isn’t flattering.”

The words were hissed through cold, iron bars in the still of night. Outside—from what could be seen of the _outside_ through the small, slitted window so far above the ground—there was no light. No glow from the moon, nor any from the stars, and not a single cloud floated across the sky. It was dark and it was cold (too cold, it seemed, for the Fire Nation) and Zuko found himself moving closer to the flame of the torch he held as he knelt down before the bars to the cell.

He sighed deeply, the weight of their troubles hanging heavily in the set of his jaw and the slant of his brow. His pale hand wrapped around the metal that separated them and the pain was obvious in his face and in the white-knuckled grasp—but it was not physical. His heart hurt. He felt as though it was going to drown him at any given moment and he would just _give in_ if it would stop making him feel so bad. 

The clicking noise she made with her tongue echoed around the stone walls drew him away from his thoughts and he slowly opened his eyes, letting them focus again on the woman in front of him. 

“I don’t know what else to do. You’re not leaving me much of a choice.” His head hung low, but he watched her through narrowed eyes.

Katara chuckled cruelly and rolled her eyes at his reply. “That’s not true. You have _many_ choices. This was your choice!” 

It _was_ his choice—and she felt the need to remind him. He could hear it in her voice,, the words she didn't say; he could _so easily_ change this—he could _let her go_ —

"Katara--" He shook his head. “I can’t, Katara. This is the only way. This is the lesser of the two evils.”

Her body slammed up against the metal door encaging her and the brittle hinges shivered against the onslaught. 

“Am I _evil_ now, Fire Lord?” It was shocking how piercing and dangerous her voice sounded echoing throughout the stone fortress.

Zuko's heart thrummed painfully in his chest. _Why hadn’t he seen it sooner?_

“You’re not evil, Katara.” 

He believed it, to the bottom of his aching, clenching heart. He reached out and brushed his fingers against the cool skin of her teeth. It was _almost_ surprising when she flinched away (he’d expected her to snap at him with her teeth this time).

"It's what you’ve _done_ that's evil.”

“I _saved_ people,” she spat. Her fists slammed against the metal and he knew it hurt her, but she was too gone to care. “I saved _you_!”

“You’ve killed innocent people—”

“ _They were not innocent_!”

“—and you’ve perverted the gift you were blessed with. You used to heal people, Katara. What happened to that?”

Her eyes slashed through him. “I’m healing the _world_. If you had any sense, you’d help me.”

“I do want to help you,” he said softly. 

He reached in through the bar and took her hand in his, twining her cold, delicate fingers with his. _Agni help me_. 

He looked into her eyes and hoped for a moment that they would soften—that the wonderful, soothing ocean in her soul would be his to see once more. That warm vibrancy that felt like mist on an island and cool snowflakes melting against his cheek all at once. He longed to see a glimmer of the unrestrained hope she'd once shone with like a beacon, the joy and love that drew him in like so many before him.

But that wasn't who she was anymore. There was no warmth, no familiarity, beneath her stony exterior. The cold in her eyes did not give way and she stared him down as though she were a lionshark studying his every move before he himself planned it. As though she were preparing to strike. She was hard edges; cold, sharp rocks hidden behind the face of a siren, singing to lure sailors to their demise. 

Zuko pulled her hand through and grazed his warm lips against her chaulky, frozen knuckles. “This is not how to heal the world. Don't you see that?"

She used to _know_ that.

He expected she'd pull back in affront, but her grip merely twisted around his own, like a vice of marble.

“What is your plan, then, Great Son of Ozai?” Zuko flinched, but he would not pull away. Her fingernails dug into his skin. She spoke, tongue laced with fire and poison, but he did not stand down. 

She pulled him closer, until the only thing keeping their lips from touching was the tense breath from both their mouths. 

“Will you raze the world like the _Phoenix King_?”

He wanted to pretend she looked scared—and maybe she did, but she’d become such a great _actress_ that he couldn’t tell. 

“Foreign relations and peace treaties be damned, you know as well as the next that there is nothing keeping the unity of our new world except the fear of another inevitable war. Will you bring about the glory of the ever prosperous Fire Nation once more? With me at your side, it would be so easy to pick through and keep only those _best_ _suited_ for your utopia—all this in the name of peace. Tell me, Fire Lord, will we all be great _firebenders?”_

“No,” he said after a pause. He finally dropped her hand--pulled from her claw-like grip--and stepped back. The distance panged like a rhythm in his chest. “But we won’t be bloodbenders, either. We will be a world of free people—with free will and honour and dignity.”

_Control over our own bodies._

Zuko hung the torch back in its bracket beside the door to her cell and sighed. Maybe another day would wield more satisfying results—maybe another day, he'd see in her eyes the woman he once knew.

“Goodnight, Katara.”

She screamed after him as he began the long trek down the hall. “You’re just going to walk away from me, then?”

His footsteps halted but he did not turn back. The desperate glimmer in her eyes reflected the torchlight—he couldn’t see it, couldn't _take_ seeing it any longer. He couldn’t look back and _pray to Agni_ that the imperceptible tilt to her lips was her old self fighting through. He couldn't study her face and relive the dreams he'd had, the dreams he still had, that seemed so far away. He couldn’t let himself be swallowed alive by the hope.

Not again.

Zuko's head hung and le let out a long, tempered breath. 

“I will never walk away from you.” 

In the deep pockets of his cloak, his fingers brushed against the silken ribbon that she had donned so proudly around her delicate neck from the moment he'd first laid eyes on her. They brushed against the glassy stone—worried smoother still since it had found its place on his person, as if he was holding that piece of her, keeping it from going cold too—and his eyes clenched shut. 

“But I can’t stand so closely anymore.”

Her fists thundered against the bars. 

“You’re a traitor, Zuko! That’s all you’ve ever been.”

It cut, but Fire Lord Zuko had more important things to consider than his damaged pride and torn heart. 

“I may be. But at least I haven't betrayed who I am.”

\---/---/---

The Council of Nations was particularly solemn that morning. 

Perhaps it was the rain that pounded against the roof of the Royal Palace. Perhaps it was the very-public-and-very-sad funeral procession that had marched through the city the last three days as families carried off diseased corpses to be cremated. Perhaps their travels had been uneasy or perhaps it was simply the _atmosphere_ of the War Room itself. 

It could have been any of those reasons, Zuko figured, but he was more than willing to bet that the downcast eyes and forlorn expressions were more due to the nature of their meeting than any other cause. Even Aang, sitting tall and dignified opposite him, hadn’t found it in him to crack even the smallest of smile since he took his seat.

So many eyes were watching him—how _long_ had they just been staring?—and Zuko's stomach twisted uneasily, as it had been for weeks. He ran a hand across his face with a breathless sigh and pulled himself to stand.

He cursed the throne at his back and the crown on his head and the lump in his throat. The ache in his chest, he ignored.

“Well?” The elder from the Northern Water Tribe was the first to speak and the rasping of his voice bitterly reminded Zuko just _how_ close to the situation they all really were.

His hands clasped behind his back. He had to stand tall. _'This was your choice,'_ her voice ghosted in his mind. Taunting him. Trying to bring him to his knees.

“As of last night, we have the bloodbender in custody in the palace hold. After the last attack, guards—”

Aang launched from his seat. “ _You locked up Katara_?”

Zuko’s ears thrummed in pain and he had to look away from the boy. “Avatar Aang, I _respectfully_ implore you to refrain from interrupting. We would all like to solve this matter as _painlessly_ as possible.”

 _Please_.

Even _Sokka_ had remained silent thus far. Aang took his seat once more—though it wasn’t Zuko’s imagination the crestfallen set to the young man's mouth nor the admonished tinge coloring his cheeks and neck. Zuko nodded at him, silently, and his heart clenched all the more when he would not meet his eye. Toph sat stoically to his left and placed a hand on his shoulder, but her head remained downturned, unseeing, at the dark fabric pooling on her lap (and if anyone asked, she was most definitely _not_ crying, _got it Sparky?_ ). 

He took in a deep breath. 

“After the last attack, we have decreased guard activity around her immediate cell but the security of the wing has been increased by a series of locks specific to firebenders. For the safety of my staff, she has been receiving a regulated dose of sedatives with her meals and a limited supply of water throughout the day with no access at night.” 

(He felt sick to his stomach.)

Zuko tried very hard to keep his chin high as he avoided the probing eyes of the chair members before him. “I must stress that if this were not such a serious threat, I would never approve such treatment.” 

As it was, he barely tolerated it. So reminiscent of the fear that had ruled the regimes of his father and his father before him, the very idea pooled like acid in his lungs and brought bile to his throat.

But it was necessary.

He saw Sokka’s eyes harden and Hakoda’s narrow at the spoken acknowledgement of Katara being a _threat_ —a _serious_ one—and he found himself unable to look away. The two strong Warriors, once his brothers in arms, were nearly unrecognizable in the firelight and fury that filled the room like a haze.

“The bloodbender—" His voice cracked and Zuko cleared his throat. "Master Katara has always been a great personal friend of mine, as well as many of yours. Because of this,, I find my judgment to be clouded. 

"This is why I humbly ask you—all of you—not as Fire Lord, but as a man and a fiancé,” he choked back the word with burning eyes and a heavy tongue. “I ask you for your guidance and for your help. This is the woman who holds my heart.”

Not so many years ago, it would have been a sign of weakness and submission when the Fire Lord sunk to his knees in a rigid bow before the council.

Hands on his knees, Zuko did not raise his head. He couldn't find it in him to do so.

“I beg you to help me make the right choice.”

\---/---/---

Sokka’s fist slammed into the wall with a c _rash._

The council had ruled that bloodbending was an ethical breach of human rights—no matter what nation or element you belonged to.

_Crash._

Katara was being tried for not only _bloodbending_ —but also _murder_.

_Crash._

Ten _known_ charges of murder.

_Crash._

They had emphasized the word ‘known’.

_Crash._

As if there could be _more._

_Crash. Crash Crash._

His—

_Crash._

—baby—

_Crash._

— _sister!_

_Crash._

“Sokka!”

Suki rushed in as fast as she could (and for being nine months pregnant and-still-counting, it was a feat). She grasped his arm before he could deal another blow to the offending wall, and though her fingers were soft and her touch was light, he knew she was strong enough to hold him back.

“Suki,” he croaked—and that was all he could say before the tears swelling in his eyes overflowed. 

Then he was sobbing into her shoulder, crushing her small frame against him so tightly she briefly wondered if he’d ever snapped anyone in half. She ran her hands through his long, dark hair and whispered at him and hushed him with words that had before soothed him so well. His hand stung and he knew he was smearing red all over Suki’s pretty wrap, but he couldn’t find it in him to move or pull away or _stop_ crying.

Her hands feathered across his face as she wiped away the tears from his cheeks. 

“Sokka, talk to me.” 

He wanted to look away, but she held his face just-so and wiped away his tears—and he _couldn’t_. He gripped her tighter and cried again into the crook of her neck, mumbling and shaking his head back and forth. Her fingers combed across the taught fabric of his tunic, trying to bring peace to his shaking frame.

“They can’t,” he finally stuttered out when he could _breathe_ again. “I can’t—they—they’re going to kill her. They’re going to kill Katara.”

**Author's Note:**

> As of yet, this is a rather long WIP. I'm posting this (prologue) as a one-shot, may come back to it down the road when the writing bug hits me again. If you have any opinions, let me know.  
> If this continues, you'll get more leading up to how we got here and following these events.  
> Cheers!


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